


Through the Ash

by joannabelle



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Almaren, Angband, Dagor Dagorath, Gen, M/M, War of Wrath, angbang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-30
Updated: 2015-11-30
Packaged: 2018-05-04 04:28:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5320460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joannabelle/pseuds/joannabelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And there is something still that dances in Mairon’s eyes – a crackling heat that Melkor remembers has always been.<br/><br/>Morgoth: A character study.  Of sorts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through the Ash

**Author's Note:**

  * For [crackinthecup](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crackinthecup/gifts).



> Disclaimer: For a short ride, I have borrowed these characters from Tolkien.  
> Rating: T  
> Warnings: None  
> Notes: I don’t know what this is, other than that it is more poetry than fic. Regardless –  
> Dedicated to @crackinthecup as the finished version of her birthday gift. <3

* * *

  
Melkor can recall the very first expansive moment of existence; and in the deepest, twisted lattice of his fëa, he has always recalled the end.  
  
In both moments he is eaten alone, caught in the curling brands of fire.  
  
(it is a fate he does not move to avert – lest he be swallowed by the joy of it)  
  


* * *

  
He steals his Maiar for the sport of it, for the thrilling, daring jest.  
  
Almaren is made of weaves, and of the whistles of the wind.  And somewhere deep inside him Melkor feels that calling; that lonely scream beneath his skin that is begging out for heat.  
  
A circlet he offers to Mairon, Smith of Aulë on the twelfth day behind the walls, for the whispered promise of a dance (he steals it along the way; the Firstborn whom owe their hearts to him; their creations, they are all to come unto his hands). The smith’s face is creased with what may be displeasure, yet Melkor sees it not, and he cares little. For it does not matter – not in the end.  
  
As the anger sits still below his skin, and it pumps like lava.  Like a thickened, burning mess.  
  
Yet there is a curious cast to the iris of Mairon’s eyes, as they flicker along the heat of Aulë’s forge – dragging down his cheekbones, and smoothing down his neck – and it takes two Ages burned for Melkor to realise this is the _One_.  
  


* * *

  
Years later, so old the world flows now Melkor _Bauglir_ almost forgets the fire, and the promise of the burn – the Lieutenant wears his hair tied back with a bow.  A plain old thing made of woven strands of silk pillaged from the light side of the hills. The alter side; where things of spine and webbed root grow, and the glow of the trees does still burn upon the dirt.  
  
Mairon is not afraid of the Sun.  
  
And Melkor questions, at times, this Maia’s attachment to corporeal things, as he ignores the burning light upon his own brow, and the charred crisp that is his hands.  
  
The Maia’s face is stern (always stern) as Melkor sweeps down the dense halls of Angband deep, the shaded figure of a beast, his hands clutched as though in memory of the Silmarils, three remaining of which offset the crown along his forehead that seems to double in weight with every passing tick upon the hour.  
  
In the Maia’s eyes, Melkor tastes the putrid (marvellous, _addictive_ ) stench of fire.  
  


* * *

  
It does not end this way, despite all of his intentions.  
  
For flames are at heart ever the hardest to escape.  
  
Melkor relishes in every roaring curse upon his name, spat from the bloodied teeth of Noldor tongue.  
  
His Lieutenant snaps the eldest’s ginger hair back until the gasp is just a sound, no more ferocious than the swirl of wind that whispers along the coast – and Melkor feels the cool of the marble beneath his boots through the dense weight of his iron heels – and remembers how much he hates to swim.  
  


* * *

  
And they beat, they beat: a steadied staccato rhythm of silver swords and twist of strychnine.  
  
For through the screams Mairon’s eyes catch his, and there is the momentary flicker of something else there – the slightest spark of something silent _known_.  
  
Melkor vows, then, feet stone and fraught with burns, the devilled beat of drums that pound ever-closer along the shore –  
  
He vows he shall drink the Maia’s soul all the way down to the ash.  
  


* * *

  
And little does he see it; the bending hills and swirl of sea, the smothering of Kings, nor the smoke that trails at horses wake.  
  
His echo’s scream is a stilted lonely thing that pierces along the mire, bouncing from every grain of sand and twist into the dirt.  But the noise is lost somewhere upon the other side: where fanged beast and Balrog lurk, and Melkor cannot reach no matter how far he stretches hand.  
  
He is adrift: a spineless, formless thing amongst himself, of mud and root and hopeless naught, spun along the wind. A Vala; tireless – yet empty and devoid.  
  
Full of fear.  
  
He is but rage itself.  
  


* * *

  
And then it is that they are stood upon the precipice (Ages later, for time is but a thing. lost somewhere in the flow, of smoothened skin and lingered taste of gold), and there is something still that dances in Mairon’s eyes – a crackling heat that Melkor remembers has always been.   
  
For how could he forget?  
  
It is the swirling lap of flames. Of a heart beating in accordance with his own – and the Vala feels a sudden surge, as though the answer is right there and yet, escapes him: forever to elude.  Mairon’s eyes, in red, they burn.  
  
And Melkor stands among the glow that swans about his waist, deaf to all – the plague of Arda no louder than the buried screams of the dirt crushed beneath his boots.  For here it drowns into the coils of his own voice – a melody long-sung and silent but for twists under the sand.   
  
Yet he stands and his feet are lead, as his fingers burn anew.  For once again he is crownless: formful, fearless, and still.   
  
He does remember the beginning; oh _yes_ – of warping coils and warbled light that melds along the fëa.  
  
Of looping sonorous sleuths that chase still along the hills in a whisper.   
  
(and of the flames that stain their the way along his skin, and the fact he is alone)  
  
Except, this time, a Maia stands before him: and his face is smooth, and his eyes are gneiss.  
  
And something is wrong here (for what a perilous tricking of fate), as the flames creep up Melkor’s arms into a lattice.  For all those Ages bound and spent alone in their beauty (with the burn of light upon his skull, the endless spin of no real thing, of the coil inside his core) and Melkor stands, at the end of all tunes, to realise his one omission.  That one lone single thing.  
  
For amongst the spark of fire and stench of skin that rots right down his tastebuds: there he stands.  
  
And faces another burning set of eyes.

 


End file.
